Venom – Fallen Angels (2011)

“Welcome To Hell”, their 1981’s debut album influenced literally thousands of bands, and while Venom were one of the first incarnations of extreme metal their giving the name of a brand new sub-genre of metal with their 82’s, second album: “Black Metal”. Although lending its name to the latter genre, today the album is often regarded as thrash metal rather than black metal. Venom’s music contributed to shape the style and to the development of many metal bands and numerous bands copying styles, themes and imagery from the band. Although even Metallica had opened for Venom on an early ’80s tour, Venom were regarded by many critics and some metal fans as “a trio of buffoons”, but also they had several conflicts with other musicians. In his Black Flag tour diary, Henry Rollins wrote about a 1986 performance when Black Flag opened for Venom and he mentioned that Venom was hilarious, with mediocre playing. Venom replayed by saying: “his band was useless and that’s why he writes books now”.
As teenager back in the 80’s I was quite fascinated by the epic 20-minute title track of their 1984’s “At War with Satan”, but honestly I never took too seriously their Satanic references. But also I have to admit that I wouldn’t bet back then that in 2011 I will listening – and really like it – a brand new Venom album. Read more Venom – Fallen Angels (2011)